Penance
by Smoltenica
Summary: In the months and years following the conclusion of the musical, Chris still remembers her- and finds it impossible to forgive himself. Rated for safety.


**Penance**

I still see your eyes.

_Sun and moon, _we had called ourselves. So long ago- so young, so naïve, so in love. _Sun and moon_, and we were meant to shine through the brokenness of the war and the emptiness of the world and spend our lives with each other.

_Sun and moon. _

But the sun and the moon don't go together. Sure, they meet up in the sky every now and then, but they're not like the moon and the stars, their meeting is always so goddamn impermanent. And then I left, remembering you (oh God, those memories, they'll haunt me every day of my life)- left, thinking you'd died, knowing I'd failed you.

And then Ellen was there, and Ellen didn't give a damn that I couldn't see her, she was just there, and- well, I guess she sort of filled the hole. And she wasn't- well, she loved me though I didn't do a goddamn thing to deserve it. And she stayed, and I liked that.

_(Even if she wasn't you.) _

And it was ok, you know? I could cope- in the daylight, I could forget, and at night- well. It was better than seeing you all day, every day, knowing- wishing- trying not to hope.

But now- now! Oh God! Kim- _Kim_! Why did you do it? Why did you leave? Why? _Why? _

Every single time I look into our son's eyes- more _your _son than mine, he's so beautiful and so like you- I see your eyes, staring back at me, hopeful, joyful, fearful- I hear myself promising to take you with me back to America, and I just know how much I _failed. _I left you. I should have looked harder, waited longer- it's not fair, what I've done to Ellen, marrying her and keeping her hopes up when it was _you _I loved, all along.

She's doing a good job, you know, raising your son. She loves Tam- I sometimes see her at night, when I'm sitting by his bed, and she'll stand in the doorway, watching him go to sleep, and she'll smile- just a little bit- then leave without looking at me. I guess neither of us knows what to say to the other now. I guess it's my fault. (I know it's my fault.)

It's my fault Ellen's in pain and in silence, it's my fault Tam will grow up without his mother- it's my fault that _you _are no longer here.

Kim, _Kim_- why did you leave? I know I failed, I know I hurt you beyond repair. But did you have to do_ that_ to yourself?

He sometimes asks about you. Tam, that is. He still remembers you- just a little. Fragments of songs, your smile, your hair, your embrace. I try to tell him what I can- it's such a pitiful amount. No matter how much I love him and hold him, the songs are never complete. You are never there.

(I will never forgive myself for being absent for so long in my son's life.)

Sometimes it feels that, if I sing long enough, _you _will appear again, and you'll be standing in the room, holding your arms out to me. Sometimes I close my eyes and I can remember that first night we spent together, I can remember how frightened you were, how tiny you were in my arms, and I remember- I remember holding you, I remember the way you looked at me with such complete faith and trust, and I remember how safe we felt, how safe, wrapped up in the other's love. How I wish I could return to those days- bring you home safely, marry you in the States, keep you safe by my side!

But you're never there. You never stay. You're only a phantom, appearing then disappearing in my mind.

_How have we come so far in one night? _

I didn't go anywhere far, Kim. I came home- to you- just as you chose to leave. I came- to _you_.

I wish I could say that you didn't die in vain. That would make me feel better- God, what a weak excuse.

I wish I could say that you could have lived, and I'd have found a way to persuade Ellen to take Tam home with us.

But the truth is- Ellen wouldn't have relented had you lived. She's too smart for that. I think she knows- perhaps has always known- that I didn't love her as much as she loved me, that a part of my heart had always been locked away for someone else. So you sent Tam with us, the one way you could- but oh God, if it hadn't been for the way I handled things, you could have _lived_!

I miss your youthful hope and faith. I miss your courage and strength. I miss your smell, your eyes, your soft lips (always happy to find mine)- the way you fitted just _so _against my body. I miss _you, _Kim. I always will.

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_A/N: So… being in Yr 12 is apparently good for my fizzling fanfiction account. It means that I procrastinate a lot, and, in procrastinating, find certain fic requests- such as the request asking I write a 'Miss Saigon' aftermath fic from Chris' point of view. In an attempt to avoid writing an essay on Virginia Woolf's __A Room of One's Own__, here is that fic (a few years late). _

_Hope you enjoyed it!!_


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